The Orphan Poppy
by RedneckPlasticFlamingo
Summary: There was grain . . . fields and fields of grain. And among them stood a single poppy; a yawn of fire among the dreary growth. A poppy that smoldered with the promise of a golden dawn. (74th Games AU) (Older Rue) (Rebellion) (More notes inside.)
1. A Sprout

**A/N: Yeah, this is a re-post. **

**This is AU, so there are some weird things going on here.**** To support the future pairing, Rue is older than she was in the books and** Katniss plays a role _waay_ later in the story. There will only be brief mentions of the District Two tributes. We've still got Peeta and Prim, though. Yaay, Peeta and Prim.

**Pairings: Rue/Thresh, Marvel/Foxface, ****possibly Prim/OC, and others, but those are the main ones.**

**Disclaimer: I only own my OCs. **

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**Chapter One: A Sprout**

The crowd of District 11 had fallen silent, as was typical when a name was drawn from either ball on the day of the Reaping. No whispers were uttered in the widespread silence. Not a step was taken nor a swathe of clothing ruffled by anyone other than the escort, Ema Lojeski, who was perched behind the podium in a sleeveless, silky pink dress with many silver flowers clinging around the middle to her thighs.

An adolescent child, Rue Arbor, stood among the sea of sweaty skin and her eyes gazed into the blossom of foliage from her spot among the other girls about her. Beams of sunlight sprinkled through trees in the distance and illuminated the empty ground. She listened for the chitter of squirrels and the mockingjays echoing them.

"Rue Arbor?" repeated the escort. Rue's fingertips clutched the hem of her dress. The day was too beautiful for a reaping, but Rue was naive in thinking for a moment that that was going to stop the Capitol. "Rue Arbor? Are you present?" Scanning the square with artificial silver eyes, the skin of the escort's neck was taut as she craned over the wooden podium.

But Rue didn't dare utter a word in response. From her sides, from behind and in front her stiffening figure, pitying glances were tossed her way, and the girl struggled to keep her eyes where they were, glued to the tattered leather sandals she had strapped over her feet. _'L__ord,'_ she prayed, and she closed her eyes for the briefest of moments as another girl's hand brushed against hers,_ 'this is a dream. Please.'_

But she wasn't going to allow herself to believe her own lie. Not when everything felt so real. Her fear was real. The bumps that rose on her ebony skin, the shivvers that ran through her body in the heated breeze of day were more real than ever.

Again, Rue's eyelids fluttered shut, but longer this time, as the escort's artificial ones honed in on her shaking figure. "There she is, so _darling._" The escort's voice was silky and fused with Capitol undertones that could be spotted by any district citizen, poor or fairly wealthy, like those in One. The escort waved Rue over with a beaming smile on her face, and the jewels on her nails caught the District 11 sunlight with the movement, twinkling like a night sky in June. "Come on, dear. This is your only chance. You of all these_ marvelous_ girls have been chosen. Now come on up and introduce yourself. Come up." Without thinking on the words, Rue revealed her chestnut-brown eyes to the crowd, whose faces were all turned towards the center of the square where she stood timid and afraid. The escort turned over her naked shoulder and gave the mayor a laughing smile. "Look at the child, she can hardly believe it."

And Rue agreed. The truth was, she didn't _want_ to believe it, and she wasn't sure she wanted to meet anyone who could find the heart to blame her for it. She wanted to continue dancing across treetops and sauntering through orchards where she wouldn't have to worry about survival any more than she already had to. So she simply shook her head to fight out the cowardly thought she had to fight away from this reality.

Solemnly, children began to clear a path for Rue with their eyes focused on her stormy hair and ebony skin, the chestnut beads that watered with tears she struggled to hold back.

She gazed up the aisle her district had cleared for her and told herself she wasn't done for. She knew with certainty that she had a chance in whatever games the Capitol had for her because she could run, she was stealthy. She was a very quick thinker and could scale halfway up a tree before a sword could be lifted or a mace swung. She could gather, and was fairly small in stature. Maybe this wasn't fear so much as shock, or the fear would go away as soon as she started strategizing.

With controlled fingers, she gripped the hem of her worn jean dress, squeezing her eyes tightly shut one last time as she muttered to herself in a voice too soft to be a whisper, the words,_ "go. Rue, go."_ She pried them open again to the delicate faces of hundreds of girls, some of the faces soft and familiar, some of them befuddled and foreign. And then, one foot in front of the other, she took off. She pressed through thousands of children whose eyes peered into her gentle face with expressions of pity and sadness, even with the slightest disdain toward the Capitol if you looked close enough.

As Rue pushed on, she felt a single hand grab hers with delicate fingers, could feel the gentle press of words into her palm, words that said, _I'll remember you._ It was the briefest of moments, yet even when she slid her hand away, she could feel the meaning of the gesture set in to her mind, could feel it develop a grip on her throat that brought tears to rest on the edges of her eyes.

She willed her hands to stay by her sides as her tattered brown sandal met the first step of the Justice Building. Her eyes itched, a few tears brimming the chestnut pieces, but her face remained stony and thoughtful. She watched as the escort's pale hand reached down from the platform, and she didn't look into her silver eyes as she slid her fingers into a weak grip around the woman's icy hand. Instead, she let her gaze dart around the frozen square, let her eyes brush over the faces of the hundreds, _thousands_ of children who were searching their minds for memories of the girl who had been reaped. Some didn't know of her. Others were sure she had been the one who tutored them in English, or fed bread to the ducks at lunch who waddled by.

"Sweet Rue, our new tribute." The escort's voice was soft and smooth, like a purr that had been practiced and trained to sound sweet and youthful. The woman slid a thumb over the ebony skin of Rue's hand, the hand that trembled in fear. "How old are you, girl?" She asked the question with silver hollow eyes, her lips colored a naked shade of chrome as she spoke into a microphone that stood from the podium, erect among others.

"I'm sixteen years old," Rue told her. The girl was still peeling her eyes from the crowd of people, and had just met the escort's startling silver ones. She even managed to pull her lips into a smile as she said the words, but it was fearful, timid.

"Well, girl, you're a darling, I'll tell you _that._" The escort was folding Rue's slip into a delicate little slip, and dropped it so it settled high on the wood of the podium, inches from the microphones that stood erect behind it. "In all my years of escorting Eleven, it would take me awhile to think of someone with such potential as you, with your pretty eyes and kinky black hair." The woman brushed a delicate hand over the kinks of Rue's dark hair, pushing a few of the curls behind the girl's ear and smiling as she did so. To the falter of the escort's smile, not a single word was uttered in the square, nor did an expression twitch or quiver in agreement.

But Rue didn't need their agreement to know that she was beautiful. Looking up at the escort with timid brown eyes, she was just glad that someone, be it a Capitolite, was happy today. It wasn't often that you saw a smiling face on Reaping Day in 11. Actually, it wasn't often that you saw a smiling face elsewhere, either. Perhaps the Career districts showed elation when a cannon fired in the games, but Rue didn't feel like blaming Careers today. She was sure that at some time, be it long ago or just last year, a reaped Career child had a lot to lose. Perhaps the had child felt as bad as she did standing beside a painted woman on her way to certain death.

Death. Just the mention of such a word sent tear dribbling down Rue's ebony skin, a droplet of the salty water curving into the gentle hollow of her throat. She hoped it wasn't visible on camera, though the red blush of her face probably was, so she just closed her eyes. Admittedly, death was something Rue didn't much care to think about either.

She felt the escort give her hand a squeeze with gentle fingers, a squeeze that trapped her thoughts into her palm and sent her back into reality. Rue caught the woman's eyes, caught her beaming white smile and the young silver lips that curled around it. "—boys," said the woman, and the escort gave a hum of a ditzy old Capitol tune as she sauntered behind the podium with pink fabric heels that click-clacked against the concrete. She dipped her hand into a bowl of glass, filled to the edge with bright white slips of paper, and in a breathless moment, her manicured fingertips landed on a single slip of paper that was wedged somewhere in the middle of the bowl.

The woman's silver eyes seemed to beam at the anticipation in the square as she unfolded the slip with a light smile curving her lips. Somewhere in the back of Rue's mind, she was wondering where her father stood among the crowd. She imagined his tired body milling alone in Eleven's groves, spending the last of his years collecting berries from the bushes he'd helped Rue plant when she was little. And that thought sent a tinge of sadness into Rue's heart, because among many other duties, collecting berries was something Rue did. For the longest time, she would wrap small handfuls of the produce in waxy leaves, stuffing them into the pockets of her only pair of overalls so her father could make jam to spread over the tough, tasteless bread she'd trade seeds for in the black market. Those berries were the only thing besides his daughter that he loved more than he loved himself. The blue ones were his favorite, and oftentimes, that was a very dangerous thing. Nightlock berries were only a slightly darker shade of purple and would kill you an instant after ingestion.

The escort turned a slip of paper in her hands right-side-up, her silver pupils focusing on the tiny writing scrawled in pen across the dainty slip. Rue's mind flashed back to a boy, small, confident in his movements, with a gleaming white smile and a nose that crinkled when he laughed. She remembered finding him sitting upright against a tree in the orchards, a ways away from the most unfavorable of the three schools in District 11. In his lap had rested a book about the harvest, the leather torn and wrinkled, the pages mangled and worn. In his chubby fingers had been a damaged length of plastic with a ball point tip and an inch of ink running through the middle.

She had offered a hand with his work, and his 12-year-old body grew tense, his shoulders high and his eyes large in his young face. When she had lowered herself beside him for the first time, his fear had sunken away and was replaced by the largest of smiles, a gleaming white grin that Rue would learn to adore on her walks home from the classroom. After a while of timid calls from that particular tree, a few quiet walks through the forest, spotting birds and naming animals, these tutoring sessions had grown frequent. Rue had even begun the tradition of hiding berries from her bush to give him, and silently, with a quiet smile on his lips, he had enjoyed their sweet taste.

Therefore when the escort uttered his name, it came to Rue as a bit of a surprise. The woman spoke it with a quiet, level voice, and in Rue's mind, the name was almost welcome, like a cool breeze on a summer day. But it came with a pang of fear and hitched her breath high in her throat, just where she couldn't reach it to breathe. The escort repeated, "Grove Orris."

A familiar dark-skinned boy with a healthy face and wide, dark eyes perked to life in the third row of the crowd. He pursed his lips into a dark line, defining the dimples on either of his cheeks. His dark eyebrows were furrowed and he slid his hands, thick with baby fat, from his jean pockets as he turned his head for someone in the square to volunteer; anyone. He took a breath and locked eyes with the escort, with Rue, who was sobbing now as she peered past mats of kinky hair and teary red cheeks. She pawed at the wetness of her face with the backs of her hands and watched as the boy held himself high, weaving through the crowd in old velcro sneakers.

He was dressed in a tattered button-down shirt that hung just over his blue jeans, worn at the knees with rips and flyaway strings where his ankles were. The escort stepped away from the podium just as Grove emerged from the crowd. A sob unfamiliar to Rue echoed from far back in the square. The little boy stumbled over feet and his throat moved in a dry gulp the closer he got to the platform. Rue sniffed as Grove reached with a baby-skinned hand for the escort's grip, and as he took the first step, a gruff, manly yell echoed far on the right side of the square, towards the back. _"No! Grove!_ Don't—don't let them—"

A few grunts sounded when a group of Peacekeepers took the man's arms, holding him away from the platform as he struggled in their arms to move forward. "No," the man grunted. "Grove!" The little boy flinched away from the escort's hand, and his eyes were glued to the man as he took a good step back.

_"I volunteer!"_ The man blurted. His voice was thick, and true. The words echoed in the air, and the man breathed thick, exhausted breaths, his eyes tired and worried as he stared up at the escort's ghost-white face. The Peacekeepers released their grip on his arms, and he nearly slumped to the ground, but caught himself in a sturdy step. He repeated, "I volunteer as tribute."

A small crowd of children were turning to face the spectacle, and Grove gave a shake of his head, as if he just registered what the man had done. "No," he barked, and his shaking tossed a tear from his eye, because his face was wet and reddened just a moment after. He turned from the platform, reaching with his hands to wipe the tears from his eyes. A single Peacekeeper took the boy by the middle, restraining his feet with gloved hands. "Thresh," breathed the boy. His voice was young, and fearful, quavering with tears and dry with sadness._ "Thresh, no!"_ With dull nails, he clawed at the Peacekeeper's armor, writhing his legs in the metal grip and beating his fist on the soldier's back.

Thresh walked toward the platform, his shoulders tense and his brows furrowed as he turned over his shoulder to watch the boy and the Peacekeeper's retreating figures. "Grove, go find Verbena," choked the man with stern eyes at his brother. "Go find her, alright?"

As he was being carried further down the path, Grove opened his mouth for a small moment before choking down his words. Tears streamed down his young face and he tucked his chin into the crook of his elbow. And with that, as Thresh pursed his lips into a thin, dark line, Grove gave an obedient nod and fell silent.

The escort seemed to shrink under the shadow of Thresh's towering figure. Not even her pink fabric pumps could succeed in letting the woman look intimidating beside him. Strength radiated through Thresh's upright body, and the very first thing he did when he met Rue's watery eyes was let his gaze linger for a moment, as if judging her stature as she wiped away her drying tears with the backs of her hands. Then with dark eyes full with secrets, he glanced away.

"_Thresh_ Orris?" The escort asked of him. Her neck was bent and her eyes peered up at him, almost a sign of submission. Her light-brown eyebrows were furrowed in concern at the man, but Thresh kept his eyes on his feet, neglecting to respond. The woman looked taken aback with her silver lips parted and her eyes drawn wide. "That was your little brother, wasn't it?" Rue was sure the microphones weren't sensitive enough to pick up on her words. "My. How brave that was of you."

The hush was fiercely palpable in the air. No-one verbalized their thoughts, and that was most likely because they knew they were all in agreement. Through drowning eyes, Rue glanced at the armored back of the retreating Peacekeepers as they moved the small boy gap of silent people. Grove had tears still on his face, a dull gleam in his eyes as he looked after his older brother. The small boy's sounds of mourning were silent in the men's tight arms.

Rue watched as the boy was released into the arms a of an aging, strong woman. Her hair was shoulder-length, gray and frizzy in a tight ponytail behind her head. She wrapped her grandson in large, wrinkly arms and huffed whimpering sobs with her cheek to his shaved dark hair. The skin was loose, dark on her face, and her grandson's velcro sneakers nipped at the hem of her floral black dress. The crowd seemed to be watching her, now.

"Thresh." The escort seemed to have collected herself. She stood up straighter and folded her hands on the podium where the jewels on her nails were bright and visible. She glanced at her fingers for a brief second before lifting her nose at the man. "I'd like to know how old you are."

And Thresh glanced at her with cold eyes. Past the shadow of his tilted head, his full lips and wide nose were the only immediately visible features about him. You had to be as close as Rue was to really see past that. "Eighteen."

His voice was low and gruff. It piqued a sense of fear in Rue's mind, and she felt the urge to back away a foot, or to even step closer. Both ideas were awful to execute before Panem. Stepping away would show cowardice, and closer, stupidity. Rue decided that stepping closer would be the lesser of two evils. If anything, it would show nerve and daring. Stupid. Brave.

And without much carefulness, she stepped a foot forward so she could almost hear the man's shaking breaths. He raised his chin every-so-slightly and looked with beads into her eyes. His mouth moved to the sound of her name, and with a heave of his chest, he looked into the audience to find with watery eyes, the image of his brother in his grandma's arms. His back was straight and his chest strong. His lips trembled against the sadness. His tears didn't fall.

Rue wanted to doubt he'd ever cried, but common sense was thick in her mind. The escort made him shake her hand, made them turn to the square, where their fists were lifted to the sky. Thresh's hand was loose against Rue's sturdy palm. His fingers were leather pads under her timid digits. Between Eleven's tributes, there was a conversation to be had. It seemed as guaranteed as blood being spilt within the next few weeks of Rue's endangered life.

They separated hands. Guided into the Justice Building, the air grew warm and musty. The light was dim and the floors wooden, the walls a breathable color of autumn orange. Feet away, Thresh was ushered behind an open door, and though the escort didn't utter a sound in the building, Rue could hear the click of her heels as she stepped against the polished wooden ground.

A door was held ajar, and Rue was guided past its hinges by white gloved hands. As the door clicked shut with a quiet click, Rue's tears seemed frozen, stuck. A lamp flickered to life in a corner of the room, and Rue half expected Ceasar Flickerman to come sauntering out of the shadows with a grin on his face to let her know how funny it was when she thought she'd been reaped. Something like her body's attempt at a chuckle escaped her lips, and she felt the urge to hug her arms around her torso.

She knew the air was warm. She could feel it as it heated her bones and smothered her thickening breaths. But as she stood alone in the center of the foreign room, her body, her heart, really, felt as if it was completely frozen.

The creak of the door seemed to echo in the eerie silence. The figure of a Peacekeeper pushed the old bones of her father into the sizable room, and the light of the hallway revealed several other chairs hidden in the musty, quiet corners. "Reid Arbor," announced the man in the armor, and the briefest of moments ticked by before the door was eased shut.

The warmth of Reid's arms curled around his daughter's body, and Rue felt her fingertips curl into the dirty cotton as she shuddered breaths into his heated chest. She found herself counting each beat of his heart, tears threatening to spill from her eyelashes, and a deep, shuddering breath echoed in her lungs every moment the thumps paused inside his chest. She felt guilty, dim. "Daddy... I'm so sorry. I... I—"

Her father pulled her closer into his warmth, pressing his cheek over the top of her aching head. "Rue," he muttered to his daughter. She felt his lips as they moved against her temple with every word he spoke. "Rue...don't be silly."

Under the pressure of his head against hers, she nodded in the slightest. She could feel his tears as they trailed down her forehead, she marked their searing heat as they dribbled down her cheeks, her skinny neck. Her father pulled away, and as he gazed down at her with tired eyes, his smile was solemn, genuine.

Rue spoke with a small voice, the word, "Daddy." He looked at the tilted edges of her lips, the glassy reflection in her exhausted eyes. He could have sworn she was a shy-eyed, giggly twelve-year-old for a second time, but it was obvious that she wasn't. She was grown. Small, but grown. Reid felt his lips move into a smile as he brushed a tear from his daughter's smooth, dark skin. "You remember that rule I taught you?"

There was a twinkle in Rue's eye and a grin that shone through her solemn mein at her father's words. "Always ch—"

"—eck your harvest; that's right!" Echoed her father, and Rue's youthful giggle split the air as a grin twice as wide split her father's laughing face. "See, you'll be back," he smiled, bright and youthful at his daughter's eyes, and the smile on her face seemed to soften in that moment. "I wouldn't doubt for the world that you're going to win this."

There was a blush that crept over his daughter's cheeks at the immense amount of pride that shone in his expression. His words were firm, but quiet. Every syllable was infused with the most honest of emotions. Rue gazed at her father, her brown eyes wide and curious. "You'll always believe in me, daddy," she told him. The words escaped her throat like an impulse. "Won't you?" She finished. She didn't know where they came from, but they spoke true and bold in her soul. It was a question to which she needed an answer.

Her father took her into his arms, squeezing her, pressing a kiss to her forehead that lingered for the longest of whiles. His embrace was warm, engulfing, but a panic entered Rue's voice and she pushed on his chest with open, timid palms. _"Won't_ you?" She repeated. Her father's eyes grew squinted and concerned.

With a creak of the door a Peacekeeper shoved himself into the room with a gun strapped over his armor, loaded, no doubt. "Thirty seconds," he reminded. There was an irritated tick in his jaw, like he was rolling his eyes or disagreeing. A visor shielded his eyes and hid whatever emotion he had to tell.

Rue's father pressed the girl to his chest, wrapping his arms around her back, and burying his face in her tight black curls. "Rue," he murmured. "I'm always gonna believe in you."

"Ten seconds."

Rue felt dried tears clinging to her face as she pulled from her father's shoulder, curling her fingers in his cotton shirt. "I love you, daddy," was all she could mumble past the thickness of her emotions as she looked into her father's fallen face. His skin was red, as red as it could be under the ebony shade of his roughened skin.

"I love you too, Rue," he told her. Around her torso, his arms grew loose, his warmth grew further away. Rue's fingers slid from his shoulders, and the Peacekeeper stomped into the room, his boots muffled against the carpet. He took her father by the arm with a rough hand and a strong pull. To no prevail, Reid yanked his arms and stomped his tattered boots in an attempt to escape the man's hold.

The light from the hallway illuminated her father's tears, streaming down his stubble-y chin, his neck, as strained grunts escaped his lips. Rue's sobs grew harder, thicker._ "No,"_ she croaked, and Reid twisted in the Peacekeeper's arms, freeing a hand from the man's steel grasp. _"Daddy. Please!"_ His daughter yelled after him.

In a panicked stillness, Rue watched as her father caught the man's jaw in a firm punch, looked on with glassy eyes as the man toppled into the table of mahogany. The room's only light flickered into darkness as the lamp shattered, leaving dangerous fragments of glass strewn over the carpet in a reflective mess. Immediately following the shatter, the sound of a gunshot echoed through the hallway and Rue was only left with enough time to croak out a sob that left her body craning over the loss of energy; the sour pain that struck deep in her stomach. Rue watched with petrified eyes as her father sank to his knees, his body falling forward with a thud that was inaudible under the sheer volume of the wail that coursed through her body.

A Peacekeeper charged into the room, followed by the other, bruised man, and the two of them towered over her as they grabbed her flailing torso. Their arms were rough, cold with the armor. Her footing failed beneath her, and just as something pierced the skin of her thigh, two gloved hands wrenched around her ankles. She lost control of her movements; her speech. In the Peacekeepers' rough hold, her body fell limp.

She listened to the sound of the Peacekeepers' boots fading into oblivion as she drooped in their arms. Beneath her moved polished wood, thundering white boots as the Peacekeepers carried her in their hurry. Sunlight entered Rue's vision in wisps of yellow light, and the very last thing that registered in her mind was the metallic odor of her father's blood, pungent as it drowned in the sour breeze of day.

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**A/N: Don't kill me; her father's death is_ pivotal_ to the plot.**


	2. A Growth

**A/N: First new chapter. This one introduces a few of my other OCs and digs into them as well as a few other characters from the book. A lot of emotion in this one. Enjoy. **

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**Chapter Two: A Growth**

A few quiet snips of scissors were the first sounds to fade into Rue's conscious. Then a quiet remark about "curliness" and the beauty of something she hadn't opened her eyes to see. She could feel cool metal clipping at her fingertips and her body felt raw, like a layer of skin was being peeled from it.

Her eyelids pried themselves to life, and she saw light creeping into her vision from all sides before the lamp of metal came into form above her. A funny man with midnight-blue lips blinked his large orange eyes in front of her, and as he disappeared with a pair of scissors, Rue felt more eyes gravitating toward her figure. A metal tray stood within arm's reach, its surface covered with innumerable brushes and jars of creamy balms and substances. The man glanced away from Rue and halted his snipping as she blinked at him with tired brown eyes. "She's waking up," Rue heard the man utter, and she wondered if this for some reason wasn't allowed of her. "Phaidria. She's waking."

Something soft and light grazed the side of her neck. It was a bit scratchy, but it was thick and had curl to it. She realized it was her hair, and that was all she could focus on a moment before another voice, more quiet and feminine, intruded her hazy thoughts. "She is not ready, Cyprien. She should rest."

There was the movement of a shadow above her, its pedicured hand tightening around an odd plastic mask, and her eyes fluttered shut so she would only have to feel it being pressed over her mouth and nose. "Breathe," a voice told her, and she listened. Her eyes betrayed her as she felt chemicals tickle the back of her throat, a fading light drowning her vision until the darkness swelled around her.

The next atmosphere she woke in was much less calm and soothing, and she found tears streaming over her skin until her breaths were too rough to catch in her swollen throat. The gloved hands of Peacekeepers were wrenched around her body, carrying her a foot above the ground where her pampered feet swung in place above their pounding white boots. The hallway was narrow and metallic, an odd contrast to the Justice Building she'd been in a time ago. The memory of her father's corpse was wispy and fogged, but failed not to intensify the sobs that convulsed her stinging body.

She didn't know where she was or what was happening to her until she was laid on a smooth, flat table of metal against the wall of a room the size of any small shack in her area of District 11. She had a flimsy gown of white fabric pulled around her body, but otherwise, she was naked and cold on the table she lay on.

Unlike the room in the Justice Building, the lights were bright and intruding on her foggy thoughts. They hardly helped her to remember the conversation she'd shared with her father. There was the gunshot and the crying, but that was all. She hadn't been able to control herself enough to retain it all and it was only now that she prompted herself to regret the fact.

She recalled only one sentence of what had happened before the yelling began. The words were misty and scarce in her thoughts. As she pulled her knees to her chest and muffled her whimpers in her gown, she imagined the words drifting farther away from her aching body. "I love you, Rue."

She sniffed into her gown. Her skin was soft and fresh against her face, cleaner and smoother than it had ever been after any old bath she'd give herself in District 11. She felt her tears slide over the skin of her wrists, her hands. The moisture was sticky on her cheeks with some kind of balm that'd been applied to her face while she was unconscious. There was a fear that for ruining the stylist's job, she'd be punished.

So she peeled her hands from where they cupped her eyes and she raised her head to breathe air into her lungs. The air was fresh, cold, and it comforted her with the image of a clean bed to slip into when she would be taken to her room in the Capitol. She wasn't usually one to tire, but merely the image of a fresh blanket brought a yawn to her lips. Perhaps the covers would be warm and the bed sheet a cool line of fuzz between herself and the mattress.

She had memories of home, where even a pillow was out of reach and a blanket questionable since she often would give it to her father when he began to shiver in his sleep from the cold. They only had one blanket to share among themselves, a tattered 4x3 burlap cloth Rue had traded leftover roots from 11's black market to obtain. A clean mattress had never been a true expectation of anyone coming home from the orchards of District 11. Her own mattress had a rough canvas cover, cracked and strewn with old seeds and bits of roots she would often forget in her pockets overnight.

The knock of a door registered far in Rue's mind, and she pulled her legs an inch from her chest when a lady with a quiet grin slipped past the sliding metal door, the heavy beat of her shoes echoing on the colorless tile. District Five's former stylist was unnatural for a Capitol woman at the very least, looking professional in simple black velvet jeans and a matching cashmere sweater with the sleeves rolled an inch from her wrists. Gorgeous as she was, the dark color was striking in contrast to the woman's pale milk-and-honey skin, and if it wasn't for the light blonde corkscrew curls she had cut to her ears, she might have come off as a bit intimidating to anyone who saw her.

Something in Rue's chest took a dive as the woman with kind eyes approached her table. The lady placed her milky white hands on her hips and observed Rue with a thoughtful frown made of her naked lips, the speed of her many thoughts almost visible as they crossed her tired face."You've been crying, darling. Haven't you?"

Rue lifted her chin to get a better look into the stylist's eyes, blue and black with so many different kinds of emotions flitting over them. When she decided the lady looked kind enough, she forced a nod of her head, but henceforth avoided the woman's stare. She unwrapped her arms from around herself and wiped a few tears from her reddened skin with the smooth back of her wrist.

"It's good that you can cry," spoke the stylist. Rue could feel a cyan pair of eyes flitting over her figure, and she glanced past the kinks of glossy black hair to pay them attention. "It shows character," Mattox added, and those signature glossy pale lips curved into a smile.

Rue was hesitant to stand for this woman, but she knew that if she didn't do it right away, she would be told to do it soon anyways. She had a worried pout to her bottom lip and a timid gleam in her eyes, both of which she tried and failed to shield from her stylist's view. "I'm not going to ask you to remove your robe, if that's what has you worried, darling. You can keep it on."

At this, Rue brushed a coil of hair from her eyes, her hand steady, and though she felt like the moment might have called for a smile, she found herself unable to force one of her softened lips. Her emotions had slowed to a pace where she could breathe somewhat, and she could almost focus. She took her knees from her chest and smoothed her robe over any area of flesh it could cover, the paper flimsy and thin over her body, and her words came in a mumble. "I thought you were District 5's stylist."

Mattox's warmth settled down beside her, and Rue scooted so her legs were off the table, squeezing her hands together in her lap and ignoring the pain it caused her. "I was," Mattox told her. "Then you broke the headlines, darling."

Rue took a breath that shuddered when it entered her lungs. She could feel Mattox's cyan eyes burning a hole into the corner of her vision, but it would take her longer to fully register what her new stylist had just said to her. For the moment, she was content following her pampered feet as they dangled over the colorless tile, back and forth, then back again in slow, tired movements.

It would have piqued her surprise to see that a pair of platform heels were swinging beside her own bare feet, suede shoes shimmering in the stark-white light. If only she had noticed. "Oh, you should see how the rest of them rave over your story, darling, how they feel so deeply for a child whom they haven't barely seen." Mattox was picking at her nails, blowing them and "cleaning" them while she spoke. She gave a fluttery little laugh and leaned in to Rue's shoulder. "And they have no clue your father's death is practically the fault of the Capitol itself."

Mattox smiled strangely with wide blue eyes and her blonde, perfect eyebrows raised as if she had told the girl a marvelous secret. And she had, practically. So she gave Rue an interesting little wink of one of her eyes before she turned her attention back to her nails, which were colorless, only buffed with clear polish to look clean and glossy. Rue could understand what her stylist was trying to get through, and she could barely create an opinion of it before Mattox began again, this time working on her other hand and "cleaning" the nails of that one.

"So, I think that I've found a way to keep hold of their attention. A plan, of sorts," she told Rue. "Just as I received 11, Arvis—my partner stylist—and I took to the books to do some research on your district. It was a cinch for us to decide that poppies, above all, would be vital to use during your campaign for sponsors, darling. Are you interested in knowing why?" asked the stylist.

There was a pregnant pause that flooded the air, and Mattox folded her hands atop a velvet thigh in her thoughtful silence. She craned her neck to explore her tribute's face, sullen, partially hidden behind a wild and glossy mane of loose coils. The collection of hair drooped heavily over Rue's shoulders, but seemed to insist on frizzing defiantly in wispy kinks in every direction. The question remained, and Rue's expression was unchanged even after a full minute had passed.

Mattox was beginning to grow impatient. "My dear, poppies symbolize remembrance. We want to make Panem remember your father. Remember your pain." Though the head stylist peered down with sympathy in her blue eyes, the tears only resumed their track down down Rue's reddened cheeks. The stylists were going to exploit her pain and her father's death. Her father wouldn't have wanted this.

Rue breathed a cool breath of air that shuddered as it worked into her lungs, and a pale white hand grazed her shoulder before touching a tear from the girl's neck. "Never will I pretend to understand the pain you must be going through," the stylist told her. Rue lifted her eyes to the woman's dewy face. She was overwhelmed. Overwhelmed by Mattox's kindness; overwhelmed by her father's death and by all of Panem's awareness of it. What Mattox had said was probably one of the kindest things Rue'd ever been told by a person, and to be honest, she had least expected to hear those gracious words coming from the mouth of a woman who'd readily styled dozens of children to send off to die.

Mattox folded her powder-white hands together in her lap as she demanded Rue's attention with those determined blue eyes. "I am going to make 11's tributes a living, breathing example of your father's memory and it will require a world of exertion. Alright? I'm putting myself into this, darling."

Rue gave a solemn nod, but the tears still hadn't dried from her face. Within nearly an hour, she'd had to remove the robe before being led to stand bare in a room of jars and brushes. A woman, Phadria, continued to glance at Rue with something like pity in her eyes as she pecked around the room in a sophisticated yellow smock with a hairbrush tucked into the pocket.

The tile was cold and solid beneath Rue's too-soft heels. All she could ask for was space. Space from away from Mattox and the Peacekeepers and anyone else who wanted to bother her right now. But she could handle the presence of Grove right now. He'd smile for her with those perky dark eyes, and if she asked him, he'd probably even talk a little less about those stupid little things twelve-year-old boys talk about. Like _passing gas,_ Grove's immediately favorite topic.

Rue felt a twitch in her lips, but it was gone after someone asked her to close her eyes. Something brushed over her cheeks and face, another thing moved over the small of her back. She almost shuddered, but pursed her lips together instead.

On the wall opposite her face was absolutely nothing. It was colored grey unlike the three other walls to Rue's sides, and she had been quite content just staring into it. It was all grey, like the tunnel of silence in her mind. Grey and painful.

The reapings began to stream before her stony face just then. No sound but the chatter of stylists filled the tile room, but the images of the reapings were more than enough to engage Rue's eyes. Before her, a quiet square. It was lined to the gates with children dressed in neat clothing, each of them engaged in some sort of chatter with another. Little girls were clad in pretty pink dresses. Boys wore suits in outlandish shades and patterns, styles that ever-so-mimicked the Capitol fashion.

Rue's eyes were still, but there was something she noticed. All around, the square gleamed with tiny bits of jewelry laced around the pale necks and wrists of girls both smaller and larger than herself. The sky in this District was an unusual color. The blue was faded and dark; the sun dimmer than usual. Clouds, heavy, yet sated for the moment, loomed over mountains and - were those factories? - in the far distance. There was grinning, easy muted conversations and a professional air that bit at Rue's mind.

But there was also nervousness. Rue spotted the twiddling thumbs and rocking feet. With the light glances that shuffled around, the feeling wasn't quite easy in this district, either.

But a lot of the strangeness seemed to click into place when bold letters drifted across the screen, advertising which district it was. One. And it took Rue a moment to grasp the message, though this district had always come first. Then as easily as they had come, the words were gone again. The escort in One had a much cleaner pedestal than the one that was used in Eleven. This one didn't rock when leaned on, and the mahogany wood was much bore polished and bright.

A paper lay flat on the smooth surface and the escort read the words mutely through a grin to her crowd of listeners. Absently, Rue thought how insane it was how with a movement that woman could silence the thousands of children who stood idly within One's gates. And how with a flick of her wrist, the woman could choose two of said children to be killed.

The escort was walking, now, to another podium on which a glass ball stood tall and proud. The first slip she chose caused the words 'Glimmer Cree' to appear before Rue's idle face. The girl who stepped onstage wore glossy yellow heels and a dress white as stark that only reached the center of her milky-white thighs. With hair as golden as the sun in spring, her lips were parted in a white smile that, as she sauntered onstage, seemed to grow increasingly vicious with every step she took. Her features were angelic and cool. Her green eyes twinkled deceivingly as she exchanged a few words with her escort.

But then the Capitol lady pulled away. With a practiced, noble gait, she was headed toward the other end of the stage and on the men's side of the crowd, people scratched their necks. It wasn't the same for all of the boys, however. Others were just silent, gazing ahead to the woman with focus in their lighter eyes.

And soon, when the escort had chosen the second and final slip, every eye in the crowd was focused on a single teenaged man. He stood in the seventeen-year-old section with a crooked grin and emerald eyes that looked confused in an unfocused way. Maybe it was the shock Rue was still in, but as a stylist sprayed her torso with funny red dye, she thought the boy's confusion made a comical match with the awkwardness of the smile he kept plastered over his lips.

The boy said something that made a few bodies in the crowd shudder with chuckles. A girl towards the front clutched her fur jacket tighter to herself as she suppressed an easy grin.

It took the boy, Marvel Hoch, awhile to take his place onstage. His hair was on the lighter side of brown and he had dimples that marked the area just below his cheeks when he grinned or smiled, which was abnormally frequently. A stylist in the room brought up his wealthy upbringing, and Rue did her best not to tune that particular stylist out. Apparently this boy's father was a wealthy winemaker, but even Rue knew that now, this hardly mattered.

Without a good ally, Marvel's chances were slim at best in the arena. He needed someone strong to win these, but at the arrogant way he carried himself, Rue had a problem imagining that he'd handle an ally very well. Needless to say, the man aired a carefree personality his counterpart didn't have. He seemed to think that this was all some sort of an inconvenience, and a personality like that; one that grinned and kissed-up and laughed too artificially, might get a tribute sponsors where he was going.

And Rue decided with a weak normalcy that he vaguely reminded her of Grove, the way he made people smile.

Glimmer and her male counterpart, Marvel, were escorted into a building of stone with jewels and diamonds carved into it at every few inches. And then, as a dark moment passed the projection, it became Two's turn on screen. The people here looked much more fierce and hungry. Like dogs, Rue's father had always explained it.

This district's tributes both looked like if the male were too old for the games and the girl hadn't been chosen, the two of them would kill things — people, if given the chance — together for_ fun_. Cato and Clove. President Snow and his wife. They would make a nice Bonnie-and-Clyde type couple, Rue thought to herself, and she was too spaced-out to consider the hilarity of that particular thought as the other districts' reapings trickled by.

And they passed, Rue spent more time thinking of her father and messing up the stylists' work with tears than she did keeping her eyes glued to the screen. And as she did watch the reapings, her face was blank and dull, but beautiful as it was being made and painted. She had the vague idea of a porcelain doll.

Five's tributes, a girl with flaming locks and a younger Asian boy with wild eyebrows, locked hands briskly. The female was jittery and quiet. Her eyes were frightened green orbs that seemed to hide something deep inside of them. Rue couldn't help how these two stuck out to her. They no-longer had Mattox to help them through this, and for the weakest of moments, she felt confusion toward the head stylist for leaving them. But then two glowing metal doors were eased shut behind the tributes and like the sound, those thoughts were muted.

The boy from Ten had a broken right leg. That's all Rue noticed afterwards. And then the sunlight was blinding her eyes and the forests came back into her glassy view. She could practically smell the trees and flowers, see the fields and orchards unfold before her in the form of her quiet home. Then the camera zoomed in on own her frightened expression. She did not look tiny. Her build was stronger and her head held high as she clutched to that dirty old jean dress of her mother's. Before Rue knew it, she was sobbing on that stage while Grove trudged toward the escort with his chin low at the ground. He was small and yet he was so _strong_. And Rue was proud him before his brother sprung to life a dozen rows behind him, screaming and flailing in the arms of covered men.

And then for some reason, Rue cast her eyes straight to the ground. Isles of bathroom tile were there to greet her tight-shut gaze. And when again her eyes were open, she paid no attention to the stylists that moved about her or the questions they asked in chirping voices. Minutes ticked by little faster than hours. And then a small child named Primrose Everdeen was trudging up steps in a colder-looking place with thick forests and mountains lining its vast outlands. Her sister, Katniss, screamed the girl's name in a voice Rue couldn't hear and Rue wanted to cry again because unlike Thresh, Katniss couldn't volunteer. And Katniss was a girl Rue recognized. She'd always stood in Twelve's crowd, standing tersely in her age group and shaking in her silent way.

Primrose shed a bare tear when she made it to the stage and her frilly escort decided to leave her alone.

A boy named Peeta Mellark was chosen. Before Rue could blink, the Justice Building door was closed and darkness was coursing over her view of Twelve's reaping. She didn't like darkness. The pitch black of 11's sky had always worried her when she was little. She remembered hiding from it; practically rushing under the blankets to make it go away - she wasn't very bright then; the coverage had only ever made it worse - and now that she was older and taller and _tribute, _the pitch still irked her.

She stared again at the screen and when the darkness stayed, she squeezed her eyes shut.

The man with orange eyes was looking at her. He had his blue lips in a smile and he was tall - taller than Mattox; much larger than Rue. A woman named Phadria wove flowers into her hair and her green eyes were very vivid and attentive as she did so.

Rue felt her hair weave around itself and tighten with each of the woman's movements. The room reeked of flowers, and the words spoken behind her didn't quite register the first time. She let her gaze slip to the ground.

The orange-eyed man pleaded with his eyes. "Sweety." Her shoulders were being held. By him, maybe, but Rue was bewildered to find Phadria and a green-haired man to either of his sides.

Phadria looked at the green-haired man, pushing a lock of light-brown hair behind her ear. Her eyes were a vivid green drawn wide at her own work. Rue could tell she was a quiet body. "We think you're ready, darling. Gamliel? Yes?" She asked the green man again. He and the orange-eyed one, Cyprien, were very similar. Cyprien was taller. They were brothers, maybe.

Gamliel pressed lightly on her arm a few long fingers. He had the same narrow features as his brother, and though he wasn't quite as tall, the man hovered over Rue with his height. "Here, look." He pushed Rue toward something reflective, a wall twice her size that worked as a mirror of sorts. Somehow, Rue didn't want to call it a mirror just quite. It was like a screen or something, and each of Rue's movements shook with technology.

The girl got to watch her own face soften. She was completely red. A soft and fragile scarlet. She was intimidating and shone with memory under the blanket of poppies that coated her supple skin. Her skin was covered in a powdery coating of red that shone dully and dark beneath the growth of flowers. The poppies dragged behind her in a short train with her steps, but being loose and free as it was, the dress broke apart at the bottom in tiny, appealing little petals of the flower from her home.

A crown of vibrant poppies had been woven through her hair, courtesy of Phadria, which fell down to her chest and shoulders in bright, uneven ringlets.

Poppies. For a weed and nuisance, they were awfully pretty. Rue had smelled them in the grain, worn them in her hair, pretending she was the most beautiful girl in Panem even when she knew she was probably far from it. It was fun to play like that in the gentle heat that was District 11.

But it was cold where she was now. She reached to rub her arms warm, and then someone had her by the shoulders and she remembered the cold gloves on her skin and how she thrashed in their strong hands. But now, the hands were soft and she didn't stir quite so badly.

A blanket of poppies had been draped over her; that was all she was fully aware of. Some flowers were glued, others were woven into the elaborate, loose dress that fell to her bare feet in a deathly scarlet cloak. It hugged her torso and flowed around her upper arms and where the poppies were not, her skin was glittering red. The flowers were loose. Beneath them, Rue could feel nothing but the other flowers that were glued to her. Nakedness.

She was bare beneath the woven dress, maybe. Something like that.

The brother stylists snuck words to each other behind Rue's image, smiles glistening on their similar faces as they marveled at their work. The other girl, Phadria, stood beside Rue and ran fingers down her hand and wrist. "Mattox should be here any minute," she told her. "You know, you look beautiful."

And then Rue looked at her. The woman was smiling solemnly and Rue told herself that none of these people belonged in the Capitol. They weren't like the others. They were different. They were better.

A door in the side of the room slid open, and Mattox sauntered through, busy and brooding. Rue found herself smiling. "Hello," cooed the tactical head stylist. She hadn't met Rue's eyes yet, but she seemed upbeat, like nothing could stand in her way. She glowed with confidence. "Hello, hello! What have we done here, where is - ?" And then finally, she turned to Rue, her blue eyes concerned at first. And then they shone. "My word. I . . ."

Gamliel wore a smirk across his purple lips. "We -"

"This is just as I imagined," Mattox told them, dazzled at Rue's still figure, and Gamliel shut his mouth and settled for shaking his head. Phadria's face grew flushed.

"The weaving, the flowers - it has flowers underneath, yes?" Mattox's eyes were drawn wide. Cyprien's blue mouth opened and the head stylist's nails glinted as Mattox dismissed the topic. "No matter. We must go; we have . . ." She glanced at analog clock that hovered in the corner of the mirror. Her nose was powder-white. It wriggled. "Fifteen minutes. Only fifteen minutes." And then her face softened and she smiled darkly at Rue. "Do you think you can handle this, girl?"

The tribute nearly frowned, God bless her, and Phadria saved Rue with widened green eyes by suddenly spouting a question. "Mattox, shouldn't we grab some shoes? I can make them very quickly just -"

Mattox looked about to blow a fuse. Her pale features scrunched, she prodded the stylists through the door with quickened steps, taking the train of Rue's dress gently into her hands and pushing the girl along. "_Fifteen_ minutes. Walk, Rue, darling; we haven't got the time."

And Rue followed the orders, shyly obedient, and Thresh's outfit caught her eyes as his team moved yards ahead. He, too, was covered in poppies, and where he wasn't his dark skin gleamed a dark and scarlet red. His muscles bulged. Glancing back at Rue, the secrets hadn't left his eyes and he was stern, cold as Rue frowned into his eyes. He turned away.

The scent of horses filled the air, and the quiet hum of a Capitol crowd rang low in Rue's ears. Louder, were the voices of the other tributes as they echoed from a giant room at the end of the hall. Rue kept her eyes low on the ground and as Thresh's stylists rounded the open corner, someone welcomed District Eleven into the games. A girl from Nine peered into the hall at Rue and her escort pulled her away. Rue's body trembled as she took another step on bare and painted feet.

For better or worse, District 11 was about to make the Capitol _remember_ what they did. And they were going to let Panem know, too. `

* * *

**A/N: I don't know, I just assumed that twelve-year-old little boys talk about passing gas. Forgive me. **

**Yeah, there was a lot of emotion in this one, and it's probably going to be like this for the next few chapters until Rue finally accepts what's happened to her father. It'll help build the Rue and Thresh dynamic, and I promise it won't slow down the plot. If anything, it'll help build it. :)**


End file.
